Universal Kids Resort Frisco — $550M Texas Theme Park Opens

Ground-up theme parks are close to extinct in the United States. Universal has now opened two in fourteen months.

Project Scope

Universal Kids Resort opened to the public on July 1, 2026 after roughly two and a half years of construction that started in November 2023. The $550 million project occupies a 97-acre site in Frisco Fields, near the Dallas North Tollway, with the park itself taking up something between 20 and 32 acres of that. A 300-room themed hotel sits alongside it so families can stay on property.

Balfour Beatty Construction served as general contractor. Gensler handled architecture and design. Dallas-based Moss Utilities put in the site infrastructure, including water mains, sewer service and storm drains.

Seven themed lands anchor the park: DreamWorks’ Shrek’s Swamp, Jurassic World Adventure Camp, Nickelodeon’s SpongeBob SquarePants Bikini Bottom, Illumination’s Minions vs. Minions: Bello Bay Club, DreamWorks’ TrollsFest, DreamWorks’ Puss in Boots Del Mar, and the Isle of Curiosity built around Gabby’s Dollhouse.

Why It Matters

The design brief is the notable part. This is the first Universal park built specifically for families with young children, which meant deliberately scaling down from the flagship model. Lower-intensity rides, shows, restaurants, retail and character meet-and-greets replace the thrill attractions that drive the ride engineering and structural loads at Orlando and Hollywood. That changes the whole cost and schedule profile, and it’s why a full resort came in at $550 million and two and a half years rather than the multi-billion, multi-year arithmetic of Epic Universe.

It’s Universal’s third U.S. resort and its sixth worldwide, arriving a year after Epic Universe opened in Orlando. For Frisco it slots into a sports and entertainment corridor the city has spent a decade assembling, and Visit Frisco has been treating the opening accordingly.

For contractors the read is straightforward. Themed construction is a specialty market with a small bench, and Balfour Beatty just delivered a complete resort in it on a schedule that would be respectable for a conventional hotel and site package of the same size.

Project Team & Details